Humanism, Secularism, Feminism

Taslima Nasreen

Taslima Nasreen, an award-winning writer, physician, secular humanist and human rights activist, is known for her powerful writings on women oppression and unflinching criticism of religion, despite forced exile and multiple fatwas calling for her death. In India, Bangladesh and abroad, Nasreen’s fiction, nonfiction, poetry and memoir have topped the best-seller’s list.

Taslima Nasreen was born in Bangladesh. She started writing when she was 13. Her writings won the hearts of people across the border and she landed with the prestigious literary award Ananda from India in 1992. Taslima won The Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought from the European Parliament in 1994. She received the Kurt Tucholsky Award from Swedish PEN, the Simone de Beauvoir Award and Human Rights Award from Government of France, Le Prix de l' Edit de Nantes from the city of Nantes, France, Academy prize from the Royal Academy of arts, science and literature from Belgium. She is a Humanist Laureate in The International Academy for Humanism,USA. She won Distinguished Humanist Award from International Humanist and Ethical Union, Free-thought Heroine award from Freedom From Religion foundation, USA., IBKA award, Germany,and Feminist Press Award, USA . She got the UNESCO Madanjeet Singh prize for Promotion of the Tolerance and Non-violence in 2005. She received the Medal of honor of Lyon. She got honorary citizenship from Paris, Nantes, Lyon, Metz, Thionville, Esch etc. Taslima was awarded the Condorcet-Aron Prize at the “Parliament of the French Community of Belgium” in Brussels and Ananda literary award again in 2000.

Bestowed with honorary doctorates from Gent University and UCL in Belgium, and American University of Paris and Paris Diderot University in France, she has addressed gatherings in major venues of the world like the European Parliament, National Assembly of France, Universities of Sorbonne, Oxford, Harvard, Yale, etc. She got fellowships as a research scholar at Harvard and New York Universities. She was a Woodrow Wilson Fellow in the USA in 2009.

Taslima has written 35 books in Bengali, which includes poetry, essays, novels and autobiography series. Her works have been translated in thirty different languages. Some of her books are banned in Bangladesh. Because of her thoughts and ideas she has been banned, blacklisted and banished from Bengal, both from Bangladesh and West Bengal part of India. She has been prevented by the authorities from returning to her country since 1994, and to West Bengal since 2007.

EVENTS

Yes, it happens in the Indian subcontinent every year. It is a big patriarchal festival celebrated by Hindus. Men and women of all ages, of all classes and of all castes celebrate Raksha Bandhan or the bond of protection. On this auspicious day, sisters tie a silk thread called Rakhi on their brothers’ wrists and pray to God for their health and well-being. Brothers make a promise to protect their sisters from all harms and troubles.

There is no such festival where sisters promise to protect their brothers from all evil and brothers pray for their sisters’ health and well-being.

Middle class is rapidly expanding. Educated people are emerging. Technocrats are everywhere. Women are becoming more and more financially independent. But everybody will celebrate Raksha Bandhan day after tomorrow. It has been celebrated for centuries but no one says, it is not necessary to celebrate Raksha Bandhan when women are becoming educated and independent and they can very well take care of themselves. Instead of encouraging women to be strong and courageous, people celebrate Raksha Bandhan which is a symbol of women’s vulnerability. The message is, women are weak and vulnerable, so they need to be protected by men.

In reality, sisters are expected to give their inherited properties to their brothers. Many sisters are forced to stay with abusive husbands because brothers are not ready to take care of their sisters. Many sisters commit suicide for being helpless. Many widow-sisters are abandoned by their brothers and flocked to Vrindavan, a holy city where they have no other alternative but to live a miserable life and wait to die. And it is not uncommon that brothers kill sisters to save family honor. If brothers protected their sisters, India would not have become the 4th most dangerous place for women in the world.

The celebration of patriarchy is the celebration of men’s superiority and women’s inferiority. The festival is getting bigger and more glamorous every year. It is alarming.